Even the bare facts of my story sounded unbelievable to some and that seemed to be true, so I use these words a lot:
“Truly, really, in a sense, in a way, it seemed.”
I developed a tick. Writing is bare bones, isn’t it? It reveals just who you are.
I was nervous.
Carmine announced it.
“Maria felt time change…”
Wasn’t expecting that.
On the Feast of Santa Lucia.
Looking at Carmine.
In Flora’s dining room the color of sand, a shore at night, they didn’t hold any secrets, it seemed, and there, that would be appropriate. You never know.
“Maria felt time change,” he did not take his eyes off of me, his owl eyes.
“And not…the noun,” he made a curve, “she spoke of action.”
I did, I felt time bend the year my father was diagnosed. He kept it a secret, couldn’t say it. I hadn’t put that together yet, only “time bends,” a mystery.
So?
My cousin’s response.
I had an experience I couldn’t explain. This only made me more Neapolitan. Franco Franzese’s hand opened all of Naples, dismissing my nerves; he could tell.
“Everyone in Naples has had a mysterious experience,” it was even fatiguing.
“Do you remember the Devil’s Bridge, Maria?”
It’s a bridge, a tourist attraction, where you can meet the devil if you want to, so no one found time-changing that unbelievable but my mother giving me away like that— impossible. Don’t believe it.
That’s Naples.
Carmine pointed — my father and I fought when we drove past it —no one goes on it, not unless you want to meet the devil — about where I was going to college.
I pointed, lost the word.
They all jumped in.
“The first time!”
I said.
“Si, si,” this all made sense to them.
I was Dante, that’s it, that’s all, perfectly acceptable here. To them, my story sounded like Dante. I grew up in some Dante family universe in the USA…and there was nothing but feeling and care there. The important thing — the point — his name is on every piazza. Immorality. This is the point. And now, I had the chance to rise to eternal life as he did. They didn’t understand why I was laughing.
Is Dante funny?
“Well.”
“Exactly.”
“And exactly.”
“GO MERI!”
“You say to me I am Dante!”
“Si si,” they were even irritated.”
“DANTE, si si, Dante, DANTE, si si.”
I don’t know what to say, they blew me away.
They erupted into applause and cheer even in revolt — for Dante, the validity of Dante, not a person to laugh at, not at all.
“Bravo, brav.”
It was done.
I was coming to realize, all the same, yes, yes, Franco urged me to continue. I had planned my life around these two events, where I went to college now living in Paris, beginning to show them just how I felt.
I didn’t even know, I didn’t even know, how I felt, that these two events were related, pinching my fingers at them, in the dark, in the dark, about all that.
“Eyes that see in the darkness!”
Franco kept saying it, sort of making himself laugh.
So, Flora concluded, you made these decisions because time changed, you felt time change, and there was nothing I could do about it, true, here here, brav, we supported each other, and now I could make new choices, accept what is. No question, no concern about time-bending…
“TELL US MERI!”
They wanted me to tell them what happened, Franco even got touched, paternal, go on, shuffling me along from the other side of the table.
“Meri,” Rosa said it as if I were cute.
“Dante,” Franco shrugged, reassured me, then commanded me to respond.
“WHERE MARIA WHERE IS PIAZZA DANTE?!”
I couldn’t even say it so I said “THERE! THERE! AND THERE!”
I threw my hand — everywhere!
They cheered and applauded, here here, very good, Vico’s hand swimming for a line of a song. He let one fly.
“Brav.”
Franco was even sincere.
I laughed.
I couldn’t believe it. My whole story seemed to fit in here even if I didn’t quite understand it. I didn’t have to. The Feast of Santa Lucia.
So in a dining room the color of sand, I began to bend, feeling so nervous, space. Carmine pushed up his glasses between brass candelabras, candles dripping, cavernous glow. His owl eyes.
“The word, Carmine, the word! FOR THIS!”
They all jumped in.
—
Bukowski takes the cake. So funny that he’s really helping me tackle this, “they all jumped in,” so I’ll read more of him. Thanks for that suggestion, it fell from the sky. I’ll keep reworking all this but I tried to edit a section quickly. I like a clean line in the chaos, I think it has a nice feel to it. So thanks.